


willing to give

by seeingrightly



Category: All For the Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-16
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-08-09 03:13:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7784449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seeingrightly/pseuds/seeingrightly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Andrew wakes up and climbs out of his bunk and gets ready for class, and Neil doesn’t. His eyes open periodically, and he watches Andrew move around the room, but he doesn’t get up even though he also has class.</p>
<p>Normally, Andrew is the one who has bad days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	willing to give

**Author's Note:**

> warning for canon-typical but pretty vague discussions of shit from neil's past
> 
> thx to [melissa](theverytiredgirl.tumblr.com) for editing but also i hate you for making me read the books in the first place

Andrew wakes up and climbs out of his bunk and gets ready for class, and Neil doesn’t. His eyes open periodically, and he watches Andrew move around the room, but he doesn’t get up even though he also has class.

 

Normally, Andrew is the one who has bad days.

 

No two bad days are the same, but Neil finds a way to roll with them. Some days it’s fighting off Kevin so that Andrew can spend the day in bed, or it’s sitting in the passenger seat without asking Andrew where he’s driving. It’s a lot of guessing and a lot of guessing wrong. It’s knowing when not to guess, when not to even ask to touch. By now, after more than a year of persistence and more than a year of Andrew without medication, Neil usually winds up curled next to him on the roof or in a bed by the end of the bad days.

 

Neil doesn’t have bad days. Neil is always fine.

 

As much as Andrew hates that bullshit answer, the only times Neil hasn’t been fine, it’s been mostly physical, and Neil has kept moving anyway.

 

Andrew is so rarely surprised. He doesn’t know what it is about Neil that manages to shake him.

 

“Neil,” he says, and Neil looks at him.

 

He looks tired, more than anything. There’s no vacancy in the expression, no immediate tension.

 

“Are you going to class today?” Andrew asks eventually.

 

“No,” Neil says into the pillow. 

 

Andrew grabs his shoes and, like he usually does whether Neil is there or not, he sits down on the edge of Neil’s bed to put them on. Neil watches him quietly.

 

“My mom,” he says after a minute.

 

Andrew doesn’t know if he means her birth or her death. When he turns to look, something else has joined the exhaustion in Neil’s expression, but he doesn’t know what.

 

Andrew sits back a little further on the bed, lets his back brush against Neil’s legs, and Neil curls forward, pushing his knees against Andrew’s spine. He looks at Andrew for a long moment, and then he reaches out his hand, lets it rest on the bed near Andrew’s.

 

It’s something new they’re trying, instead of asking for a yes every time - marking their intentions clearly and slowly, and then waiting for what the other is willing to give, and if the answer is nothing, pulling back.

 

Andrew wraps his hand around Neil’s wrist and squeezes briefly. Neil shuts his eyes and presses his face back into the pillow.

 

When the bedroom door opens, Neil flinches, and Andrew tightens his grip again. Kevin is in the doorway, looking between them suspiciously.

 

“Can I help you?” Andrew asks in his least helpful tone.

 

“I didn’t see Neil head into the bathroom to get ready,” Kevin says, coming further into the room so he can see past Andrew. “Is he sick? Neil, are you sick?”

 

“No,” Neil says. “I’ll be fine for the game tomorrow.”

 

“Good,” Kevin says, looking very relieved for a very brief moment, before he turns suspicious again. “Then why aren’t you going to class? You know you have to keep your grades -”

 

“He knows,” Andrew says, and then Kevin notices his hand still wrapped around Neil’s wrist.

 

“Are  _ you _ going to class?” he asks, slipping quickly toward outrage, but before Andrew can reply, Neil does.

 

“Kevin,” he says, and his voice is tight but he’s clearly trying to make it come out normally. “It’s the anniversary of my mom’s death. I need the day off.”

 

“Oh,” Kevin says, startled, the way most of the team still is when Neil is bluntly honest.

 

Andrew wonders if Kevin is also picturing the details Neil left out, the ones about burning her body himself.

 

He’s not going to be able to smoke today at all. He ignores the itch that starts up as soon as he realizes.

 

“Go to class, Kevin,” Andrew says, because he’s still hovering in the middle of the room looking uncomfortable.

 

Kevin leaves, and Andrew finally loosens his grip on Neil’s wrist, but he leaves his fingers there, pressed against his pulse.

 

“My class starts in a few minutes,” Andrew says.

 

Neil doesn’t answer, but he curls forward a bit more, twists his wrist under Andrew’s hand like he’s thinking about grabbing it.

 

“Neil,” Andrew says. “Am I staying or going?”

 

“Staying,” Neil says quickly.

 

Andrew stands up to kick his shoes back off and Neil moves behind him, startled, but he stills when Andrew turns back around. The look on his face is close to something Andrew hasn’t seen since he was chemically forced to find it funny. It’s not fear so much as the expectation that everything will be ripped out from under his feet.

 

“Sit up,” Andrew says, and then he shoves Neil’s pillows on the floor and climbs onto the bed.

 

Normally when Andrew is feeling physically generous, willing to do something he normally wouldn’t, he balances it out with a challenge, with some push and pull, whether from his mouth or his hands. Sometimes he needs to do both. Neil isn’t up for that right now, though, not what Andrew would normally need in order to let Neil’s head rest on his thighs, to let Neil pull Andrew’s hand to rest against his hair.

 

“Is that okay?” Neil asks a few moments later, because Andrew’s fingers are unmoving where he placed them.

 

Andrew flexes his fingers. Thinks about running them through Neil’s hair. Scratching against his scalp.

 

No. That’s not something Andrew can do if he’s not going to be  _ mean  _ about it.

 

He moves his hand to Neil’s shoulder.

 

“Here,” he says, and Neil relaxes under him.

 

Andrew’s not sure what else he could offer, what someone else would offer, if he’s willing to give whatever it is he should give. He doesn’t like situations where he’s not sure what to do and actually cares about the answer. He’s not used to them.

 

He doesn’t realize his hand is fisted in the shoulder of Neil’s shirt til Neil reaches up and brushes at his knuckles, looking back at Andrew over his shoulder. Andrew releases the material and curves his hand around his shoulder again, and Neil rolls away, pressing his nose into Andrew’s thigh.

 

Neil’s breathing slows a little and his shoulder sags under Andrew’s hand. He’s not sleeping, and Andrew can feel the clench of his jaw against his leg. He stays still and quiet for a long time.

 

This time last year, Andrew remembers preparing for playoffs, kissing Neil on the living room rug. He remembers Neil looking at his phone in a way that mildly annoyed Andrew at the time and now makes his stomach clench with the thought of what Nathan Wesninski could’ve done with a little more time.

 

He doesn’t remember any hints that Neil was dealing with the anniversary of burning his mother’s corpse, any unexplained moments where Neil told someone he was fine and didn’t mean it.

 

It’s a while before Neil turns to look at Andrew over his shoulder. Andrew knows there’s nothing to see on his face, but as usual, that doesn’t stop Neil from finding something.

 

“Take a turn,” Neil says, and Andrew blinks down at him.

 

“Why? Do you have something you want to ask me?”

 

“No,” Neil says, “but you do.”

 

Andrew hates him.

 

“You didn’t do this last year,” he finally says, not exactly asking and definitely not gentle.

 

“I haven’t done this any year since it happened,” Neil says. “I was keeping my promise to her. I was running.”

 

“Not last year,” Andrew says again.

 

“Last year I was breaking my promises,” Neil says. “She would’ve hated everything I was doing. And I wasn’t sure if she was right or wrong. I had a countdown in my pocket, but I stayed. She would’ve been so angry.”

 

“You didn’t want to think about it,” Andrew guesses, and Neil nods and shifts onto his back, so Andrew lets his hand fall to Neil’s chest.

 

“I wouldn’t have told anyone even if I did,” he says, and Andrew gives him a look til he concedes, “You know that part. I know.”

 

“Would she still be angry?” Andrew asks, and Neil shrugs.

 

“Probably,” he says. “Worried and angry were basically the same thing for her. She wanted me safe. I’m as safe as I can be now, but I took a stupid path to get here.”

 

“You did,” Andrew agrees, and he brings his hand up to trace the edge of the burn on Neil’s cheek.

 

Neil reaches up and wraps his fingers loosely around Andrew’s wrist, and Andrew wants to hear him say that he knows his mom was wrong. His thumb presses hard against the corner of the burn, the hinge of Neil’s jaw. 

 

“She wouldn’t think this is better than being on the run til you die like she did?” Andrew asks, blunt.

 

“I doubt she would,” Neil says, but he smiles, the way he does when he decides to interpret something Andrew has said as charming or sentimental or nice.

 

Neil probably heard the question as Andrew being thankful that this is the path he ended up on, rather than dead in a ditch somewhere. But it was just a statement of fact.

 

Still, Andrew knows Neil is right about how his mother would feel. Neil has told him what she did whenever he disobeyed her.

 

“I wouldn’t let her near you if she was alive,” Andrew says, even though it doesn’t make any sense, even though Neil wouldn’t be here in the first place if she was.

 

Neil laughs, pressing his face against Andrew’s shirt.

 

“She wouldn’t let me near you either,” Neil says.

 

“I know,” Andrew says, touching the corner of Neil’s mouth.

 

His mother had caught him talking to a girl in the neighborhood where they were squatting, when Neil was young, barely old enough to be interested in that way in the first place. She’d dragged him away, warned him about the dangers of attachments, and then stitched him up herself. There isn’t a scar, but Andrew can see it whenever Neil mentions her.

 

“Hey,” Neil says suddenly, grabbing his wrist again. “Let’s drive somewhere.”

 

Andrew raises an eyebrow. Neil spent most of his time with his mother driving away from from their past. Neil almost exclusively suggests going for a drive when he thinks Andrew needs it. Neil doesn’t make impulsive decision this close to an Exy game unless the mafia is nipping at his heels.

 

“Just for lunch,” Neil says. “We’ll come back for practice.”

 

He throws back the blanket and rolls off the bed before Andrew can decide what his expression means, so Andrew slides forward and puts his shoes back on, then grabs the pillows off of the floor and throws them onto the bed. When Neil comes back from the bathroom a few minutes later, he still looks tired, but not like he’s expecting anything else bad to happen, not desperate or shaken.

 

“Ready?” he asks, and Andrew walks over to him and holds out the keys.

 

There is a small part of Andrew that wants to see what he does behind the wheel, how far he drives, if he hesitates to pull onto the highway. Part of him wants to know what it means when Neil shakes his head and doesn’t take the keys.

 

“You can pick,” Neil says.

 

Andrew hates the part of himself that cares when he doesn’t understand Neil. He pushes past Neil and out into the living room, but Neil touches his arm, so he stops. Neil’s studying him, his head tilted a little, when Andrew looks back over his shoulder.

 

“What?” Andrew asks, less because he wants to know what problem Neil has decided they have now, and more because he’d rather get it over with.

 

“I know I have a lot of issues,” Neil says, and he sounds amused but there’s something sharper underneath when he continues, “but not every decision I make is because of them.”

 

“Today they are,” Andrew says shortly.

 

Neil makes a face, and then steps forward and snatches the keys from Andrew.

 

“Right,” he says, “well, if you’re assuming I’m not wearing my Exy hoodie today because the color would remind me of setting my mom’s body on fire, don’t worry, it’s actually because I haven’t done my laundry yet.”

 

He stalks out of the apartment and lets the door slam shut behind him. Andrew waits, but he doesn’t hear footsteps retreating down the hallway, so he follows, locking the door behind them both.

 

Neil speeds. He doesn’t seem to be paying attention to where he’s driving. His knuckles are white on the steering wheel. Andrew knows it’s because Neil’s pissed at him rather than a desire to run, a memory of running, and he reclines in the passenger seat and waits to see where they end up.

 

After a half an hour of silence, Neil points to the console.

 

“There’s an extra pack and a lighter,” he says, and Andrew realizes he’s been tapping his fingers where they rest on his thigh.

 

He shoves his hands in the pocket of his hoodie.

 

“I know you didn’t grab yours,” Neil says.

 

“For a reason,” Andrew replies.

 

“You’re going to have to smoke at some point.”

 

“No I won’t,” Andrew says.

 

“Right,” Neil says, “sorry, I forgot that just because you decide something that makes it true. Andrew, you can go ahead, I’ll be fine.”

 

Andrew feels himself go very still. He doesn’t turn away from the window when he speaks.

 

“I thought you weren’t pretending this year,” he says, and he feels Neil turn to look at him.

 

He knows as soon as he says it that Neil will hear  _ I thought you weren’t pretending with me _ . He keeps looking out the window and lets his fists clench where they can’t be seen.

 

“I know that I don’t have to be okay,” Neil says eventually. “But I want to be.”

 

“You’re not okay,” Andrew says.

 

“I’m not,” Neil agrees.

 

When Andrew’s fingers start to twitch again, he pulls them out of his pocket and reaches over to dig them into Neil’s thigh, and Neil’s hand ghosts across them before moving back to the steering wheel, his grip relaxed.

 

After they’ve been on the road for nearly an hour, Neil eases off the highway and finds a diner. It’s run-down, small and full of old music crackling out of older speakers. Neil’s quiet and only eats about half his food, and he watches the other patrons with mild interest, not assessing but maybe remembering when he had to be. While they’re waiting for the check, he shoots Andrew a look.

 

“You’re staring,” he says. “That’s my job.”

 

Andrew gets up and heads outside to lean against the driver’s side door, his arms folded on the roof of the car and his chin resting on them. He’s bored of being unsure what to do with Neil today. Whether or not Neil will tell Andrew what he needs, whether he’ll do it before or after his inevitable breakdown - Andrew doesn’t need to know the answers, but he can’t guess with certainty, so it might be an interesting mess, when it comes.

 

When Neil comes outside, he tosses the keys to Andrew and gets in the car without complaint. Andrew doesn’t notice that he’s fallen asleep with his head against the window until he makes a weird noise halfway through the drive, something low and displeased. He makes the noise a few more times without waking up, so Andrew pulls over onto the shoulder and turns the car off.

 

“Neil,” he says loudly, and then he tries again, leaning back toward his own door in case any limbs come his way.

 

After a few more tries, Neil flinches awake, sitting up quickly. He reaches to his right and smacks into the door, then turns a confused look on Andrew.

 

“Oh,” he says, and then he leans back, breathing deeply. “I - ”

 

Neil unbuckles his seatbelt and practically launches himself out of the car, heading on an unsteady path along the roadside grass for a few feet before he sits down suddenly, facing the car. Andrew gets bored after a few minutes of Neil just sitting there and goes to join him.

 

“I don’t want to be in a car,” Neil says.

 

“If you walk from here you’ll be back in time for the game tomorrow but not practice tonight,” Andrew replies.

 

“I know,” Neil says darkly.

 

He’s glaring down the road, at the half an hour they still have to cover. Andrew reaches out and holds his hand a few inches from Neil’s chest.

 

“Yes or no?”

 

Neil looks at him for a few seconds before giving his yes, and Andrew pushes on his chest til he lays back in the grass. He rests on an elbow and leans over Neil, who waits patiently to see what he wants to do, the aggravation already starting to slip from his face.

 

“I overheard Kevin and Dan talking about the freshmen yesterday,” Andrew says, and Neil’s expression slides into something completely disbelieving. “Kevin said they’re all a waste of time and Dan said they just need more encouragement.”

 

Neil shoots him a skeptical, disdainful look, his lips pressed firmly together. Andrew waits with an eyebrow raised. It takes less than thirty seconds.

 

“Fine,” Neil groans. “They need more discipline than Dan’s giving them right now but not the kind  _ Kevin _ wants to try - ”

 

Andrew mostly tunes Neil out as he talks, paying just enough attention to make sure he stays on topic, and he runs a hand along the parts of Neil he can reach to add to the distraction. He keeps his hand above the clothes, not wanting to touch any scars or actually start anything. The tension in Neil’s shoulders is the regular kind, the kind that keeps him moving, the kind that eats away almost any other kind.

 

“Hey,” Neil says suddenly, and Andrew tunes back in. “Yes or no?”

 

“Yes,” Andrew says, and lets Neil pull him down into a firm, lingering kiss.

 

“Okay,” Neil says, pushing at Andrew’s shoulder til they both sit up. “Let’s go. You drive.”

 

In the passenger seat, Neil turns so his back is to the door and his eyes are on Andrew, who tries to keep his fingers steady on the wheel and his mind off the cigarettes in the console.

 

“Do you want to take your turn now?” he asks.

 

“No,” Neil says quietly, and Andrew doesn’t blame him; there are so few answers to give that wouldn’t sour the day further.

 

“Will making you talk about Exy work again?” he tries instead, and Neil huffs out a hollow laugh.

 

They make it back to the Tower in one piece, but Neil doesn’t get out of the car, just stares up at the building, so Andrew starts the engine again and heads to the Court. Practice isn’t for a while, and normally they would eat dinner before heading to practice, but Andrew doesn’t think Neil would eat anyway. Wymack looks surprised when they come into the lounge. 

 

“Oh,” he says. “Kevin said you might not show up today. I sure as fuck wasn’t expecting you here early.”

 

Neil doesn’t say anything, just heads straight into the locker room, and Wymack squints after him.

 

“He okay?” he asks. “And not Neil’s version of okay, actually okay. Kevin didn’t complain an obnoxious amount when he told me, so I’ve been worried.”

 

“Probably,” Andrew says with a shrug.

 

Wymack stares at him for a long moment.

 

“I’m gonna take that nonchalance as a good sign,” he says, “and if that turns out to be a bad choice I’m going to make your life difficult, Minyard.”

 

“Don’t you always?” Andrew asks before heading into the locker room himself.

 

Neil is sitting on the bench in front of his locker, his bottom half changed out but his shirt still firmly in place. Andrew stands behind him, and Neil tilts his head back slowly, giving Andrew time to move if he doesn’t want the crown of Neil’s head against his chest. Andrew stays put.

 

“I don’t really want to be here,” Neil says, and Andrew waits. “But I don’t want to do nothing either.”

 

Andrew wants to say,  _ welcome to my world _ . He wants to laugh. He wonders if Neil will wake up happy tomorrow morning, thinking he understands Andrew a little better now.

 

“Do you want me to find Kevin?” Andrew asks. “He’s not very persuasive but he is very annoying.”

 

Neil sighs and shifts so that his shoulders lean against Andrew’s stomach.

 

“Yes or no?” Andrew asks, and he reaches for the hem of Neil’s shirt.

 

Neil shifts to give him a confused look and doesn’t answer.

 

“Close your eyes,” Andrew says, and Neil nods, closing them and lifting his arms.

 

Andrew pulls the shirt off, then moves around the bench and digs into the locker, putting the equipment on Neil piece by piece, methodically, not gently, til his skin is covered again. When he’s done, Neil opens his eyes, and he looks calmer, so Andrew moves over to his own locker to get ready.

 

While they wait for the rest of the team to show up, Neil runs precision drills and Andrew sits on the floor in front of the net. He notices how poorly the drills are going when a ball ricochets off the wall and bounces off his helmet, which often happens on purpose but never by accident. Neil growls and throws his stick on the floor, followed by his helmet. Andrew stands up and pulls his off too, then goes over to Neil and shoves him til they’re both jogging around the edges of the court. Neil picks up speed and Andrew watches him, the grind of his teeth and the color in his cheeks, the way he doesn’t seem to notice when he laps Andrew. He startles badly and stops running when the door bangs open and Nicky comes inside, talking loudly to Aaron.

 

Throughout practice, Neil is distracted and laser-focused in turns, which is only made more noticeable by the fact that Kevin isn’t yelling at him the way he usually does. When they take a water break, Neil heads straight for Kevin, and Andrew is about to follow, but Dan comes up to him, her eyes full of concern as she pulls off her helmet.

 

“Hey, what’s going on?” she asks Andrew. “I’ve never seen Kevin quiet after a fight, but I’m not sure what else would be bothering both of them this much. Is it going to be a problem tomorrow?”

 

“No,” Andrew says, pushing past her. “It’s a problem right now.”

 

Right as he reaches them, Neil shoves Kevin back against the boards and leans in close. He can’t hear what Neil is saying, but he can hear the tone, and it’s not one Neil lets himself use often.

 

“Hey,” Wymack yells from somewhere in the bleachers. “Cut the shit, Josten.”

 

Andrew turns to shoot Wymack a warning look, but Neil steps away from Kevin and his expression fades to something more annoyed than homicidal.

 

“Sorry, Coach,” Neil says, and Andrew can hear the relief buried in his tone.

 

Kevin stomps away from the wall and toward the bench, shoving Neil a little as he goes.

 

“Focus on hitting the defense like that instead of me,” he barks, and Neil rolls his eyes before he heads over to grab his water too.

 

Wymack catches Andrew’s eye when he turns back around, and Andrew nods. He’s not surprised it had to be knocked into Kevin to treat Neil normally, but now that it’s there, it’ll stick. 

 

Dan looks between Kevin and Neil as they stand a few feet apart, drinking water casually, and eventually she rolls her eyes.

 

“Alright,” she says, “fun’s over. Let’s get moving again.”

 

When practice ends, Neil hangs back but waves for Andrew to go on ahead, so he does, showering and changing and waiting until the locker room empties of everyone else and Neil finally comes in. He peels off his shoes and socks and switches to his shower shoes and then pauses, so Andrew heads over.

 

“Close your eyes,” he says again, and then he undresses Neil down to his shorts, and then, after a moment, he says, “Hang on.”

 

He sits Neil down on the bench and then takes off his own shirt and armbands and switches back into his shorts and shower shoes. Grabbing both of their towels and some soap and Neil’s wrist, he maneuvers them carefully into a shower stall.

 

“Shorts on or off?” he asks, prodding Neil out of the way so he can turn on the water without burning him.

 

“Oh,” Neil says. “They can come off.”

 

Andrew helps him out of them, leaving his own on, and Neil moves under the spray, tilting his head back and sighing. When he reaches out a hand, Andrew passes him the soap. As he rinses off after, he misses a streak of bubbles, and Andrew reaches out his hand.

 

“Left shoulder,” Andrew says, waiting til Neil nods, and then he wets his hand and wipes the suds away.

 

Neil jumps anyway, and Andrew pulls his hand away quickly.

 

“Sorry,” Neil says immediately, “I thought you meant my left.”

 

“I should have been clearer,” Andrew says tightly, curling his hand into a fist and pressing it hard against his leg.

 

“You will next time,” Neil says with certainty, and then he fumbles behind himself to turn the water off.

 

They dry off in silence, and Andrew is very specific about which wrist he’s going to grab before he does it, and then he gets them both dressed again. Neil opens his eyes blearily once his upper body is covered.

 

“I’m not hungry,” he says, “but if you want to eat - ”

 

Andrew shakes his head and heads for the car, Neil close behind.

 

“Where now?” Andrew asks.

 

“Roof.”

 

It’s a little cold still to be up on the roof in just their sweatshirts at night, and Andrew pulls his sleeves over his hands before shoving the door open and stepping outside. Neil sits close next to him near the edge and they both shove their hands into the pockets of their hoodies.

 

“Yes or no?” Neil asks, his voice close, and when Andrew agrees, Neil’s forehead presses into his shoulder.

 

Neil sighs heavily, and Andrew curls his hands into fists in his pocket and doesn’t think about the pack of cigarettes down in his desk, or the one in his car, or the one in the pocket of a pair of jeans on his floor somewhere.

 

“I don’t like this,” Neil says eventually. “Letting myself do this.”

 

“What would you do instead?” Andrew saks, and he feels Neil shrug.

 

“I don’t know,” he says. “I don’t know how people do this. I don’t know how to be a real person.”

 

“You’ve been doing it all year,” Andrew says, and he pauses before continuing, “You know that you know someone who could help you figure this shit out.”

 

He feels Neil go tense like he usually does at the mention of Betsy, but he doesn’t pull away, and Andrew lets him ignore the comment. After a minute he relaxes again.

 

“I don’t want to sleep,” Neil says quietly, pressing his face against Andrew’s shoulder.

 

“We have a game tomorrow,” Andrew says, and he feels Neil’s brief smile through his shirt.

 

Most of the times that they’ve shared a bed, it’s been a larger one, but a few times when they’ve had the dorm to themselves they’ve shared Neil’s bunk. There have been problems, rude awakenings, but it’s doable, and Andrew has played through worse than a bad night of sleep, and if he’s up in his bunk it’ll be an ordeal to wake Neil up from the nightmares he’ll probably have.

 

On the other hand, it might make things worse for Neil to have another body in the bed.

 

Despite the awkward angle of his neck, Neil’s breathing starts to slow after a while of them sitting there quietly, so Andrew nudges him til he sits up, then pulls him to his feet. Kevin’s in the living room watching something on his laptop with his headphones in and he doesn’t even look up when they come in. When Andrew heads out to the bathroom to get ready for bed, though, Kevin pulls out one of his earbuds and gives him a look. Andrew just raises an eyebrow in response, because he’s not going to give information if he’s not asked a specific question. Kevin seems to take that as confirmation that he has nothing to worry about and goes back to his laptop.

 

While Neil is in the bathroom, Andrew sits down on the edge of the bottom bunk, and Neil looks a little surprised to see him there when he comes back. He waits by the light switch.

 

“Am I staying or going?” Andrew asks.

 

Neil tilts his head, thinks about it for a long moment, and then turns off the light.

 

“Staying,” he says as he makes his way over to the bed.

 

Andrew crawls under the blankets and holds them up til Neil grabs them, and then shuffles til his back is to the wall and his head is resting more on his arm than the pillow. Neil settles down facing him, though they both know he’ll roll the other way to actually fall asleep. For now, it’s fine that their legs overlap a little.

 

“Yes or no?” Neil asks, and Andrew waits until he elaborates, “Just kissing.”

 

“Yes,” Andrew says, and one of Neil’s hand finds its way to his hair as he shifts forward to press their lips together, softer than Andrew is expecting.

 

With their faces still very close, Neil speaks quietly, almost quietly enough to get lost in the dark.

 

“Thanks,” he says against Andrew’s lips, and Andrew presses their mouths together again.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr at [lydia---branwell](lydia---branwell.tumblr.com)


End file.
